


Hunger

by Lies_Unfurl



Category: Supernatural
Genre: Aftermath of Torture, Cannibalism, Dean in Hell, Eating Disorders, Flashbacks, M/M, Torture, Vomiting
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2016-11-26
Updated: 2016-11-26
Packaged: 2018-09-02 09:29:55
Rating: Mature
Warnings: Graphic Depictions Of Violence, Rape/Non-Con
Chapters: 1
Words: 3,386
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/8662297
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Lies_Unfurl/pseuds/Lies_Unfurl
Summary: Dean returns from Hell to find his relationship with food drastically changed.





	

**Author's Note:**

> Please heed the tags -- this fic contains nonconsensual Dean/Alastair, graphic depictions of torture, and disordered eating.

The first thing Dean eats when he comes back – eats, really eats, not counting the dirt that he swallowed and choked on as he clawed his way to the surface – is a chocolate bar. Hershey’s milk chocolate, to be precise, stolen from the empty gas station with the shrieking and the shaking that freaks him out, but doesn’t help his appetite any.

He doesn’t realize how much he’s missed it until the wrapper is off and the scent fills his nose, bringing back memories he never realized he had: of a motel room when Sam was six and Dad was away, and so he took Sam out trick-or-treating, a pleasure forbidden to them all Halloweens since Dean was four. Their treasures spilled out onto the stained carpet, and how sweet each KitKat, Butterfinger, Milky Way smelled when freed from its plastic confines. A candy store right before Christmas. Sam had been in a mood all week, and Dean couldn’t ignore it, couldn’t stomach the continued feeling that his brother’s teenage angst somehow reflected back on himself and he just wanted to make things _right_ again, even if that meant maybe he’d have to skip a few meals in the upcoming days. How happy Sam had looked when Dean told him to get whatever he wanted, and how it was worth it even when he faked being sick so Sam wouldn’t wonder why he didn’t have an appetite. A diner where they served freshly-baked chocolate chip cookies. Skipping school to kiss a girl who tasted like the discount Valentine’s Day chocolates he bought her. Dad handing him a Hershey’s bar from a gas station very similar to this one, because they’d been in the woods for longer than they should’ve been, and their food had run out two days ago, but they were getting so close to the rake they couldn’t just stop—

Bites into the chocolate. Feels it break off, smooth in his mouth. Creamy surface melting against his tongue. An almost unbearable sweetness filling him. He finishes it in seconds.

Miles down the road, he throws up, his stomach rebelling against the first offering he’s made to it in months. Really made. In the hours since he’s been out, he’s convinced himself that the past forty years don’t count for shit.

Dean spits out the last of the acid, takes a swig from his water bottle, and continues walking, his stomach a void inside of him. It could wait. Had waited this long. Could last a little longer.

*

He never thought you could hunger in Hell. It didn’t make sense, really. Food kept you alive; hunger was an evolutionary response letting you know that something was wrong, take a break, have a bite. It wasn’t relevant anymore. Unnecessary. He could stay alive while his lungs filled with acid, while his esophagus was split in two, while hellhounds tugged out his intestines and feasted while he screamed. He didn’t need food.

But of course, the hunger wasn’t constant. Just there when it needed to be. When it served a purpose.

If there’s one thing he can say for Hell, it’s that they didn’t waste time or energy or anything. Like it was an efficient machine designed to break souls, every drop of blood shed for part of the grander scheme.

*

When Sam finally lets him go, when they’re done with trying to figure out why he’s back, when he’s insisted that he doesn’t remember anything, Sam finally asks him if he needs anything.

“Are you hungry? Thirsty? Any injuries? Fuck, I should’ve asked you first—”

“It’s fine,” Dean says, and he means it, because he’s back here with Sam and if none of this makes sense, that’s okay with him. As long as it’s really real. “Really. I kinda just want to grab some sleep.”

Sam nods, sniffs, and then hugs him again. “Yeah, of course. God knows you deserve it.”

And then he’s lying down, and in his dreams he’s sipping something hot from cupped, clawed hands, and he knows instinctively that it’s his own blood, drained from his femoral artery, but he’s thirsty and so goddamn cold; it isn’t really worth it to resist—

When Sam wakes up the next morning, Dean is lounging in bed, using Sam’s laptop to catch up on all the current events he’s missed the past few months.

“Couldn’t sleep?”

Dean shrugs. “Been sleeping like the dead for a couple of months. Guess I’d rather be awake.”

Sam looks at him for a moment too long, before nodding. “Okay. Yeah. Uh, wanna go grab breakfast?”

“Yeah.” It’s true. He’s hungry. He’s been so busy searching for Sam that he’s been ignoring what his body needs to function. Right now, though, nothing sounds better than himself and his little brother sitting in a diner, like they have a thousand times before.

But then they’re in there, menus in front of them, and the scent – bacon frying. Pale meat darkening, crackling in its own fat. Smoke fills his nose and his eyes are watering and

*

Alastair’s knife scrapes up his leg, peeling his flesh off in long, skinny ribbons. Dean doesn’t scream. It’s not even that bad. He’s been skinned before, been stripped down to the bone and somehow been conscious through it all.

“Running out of ideas?” he rasps out. Smirks. Doesn’t know how long he’s been here. Doesn’t really matter. Time’s a useless concept when you’re up against eternity.

Alastair clicks his tongue against pointed teeth. “So impatient. One day you’ll learn, my boy, that there’s always a point to anything I do.”

That doesn’t require a response, and so Dean doesn’t grant it one. Just closes his eyes. Thinks about Sam. Reminds himself that this all is worth it.

The hunger creeps in slowly. Starts like an itch he can’t quite reach. A reminder that he’s still a human. They’re not going to make a demon out of him.

He sinks into it at first. As Alastair’s blade lovingly butchers his shin, he thinks about food. Tries to recall the best diners he’s ever been to. Tries to remember years upon years upon years ago, when his mother cooked for him. His mouth waters. Desire is preferable to pain.

But it doesn’t go away. It worsens. Emptiness grows and grows, and he finds himself shaking upon his chains, muscles contracting in a desire to curl up and hold himself, put pressure on the painful hollow within.

A chuckle from Alastair. A claw stroking his cheek. “Past your lunchtime, is it?”

Dean doesn’t answer. Can’t stand to open his mouth and find nothing there to sate his hunger.

And then he smells it. Roasting meat. He’s so used to blood and sulfur, or flames turning him to ash. This is different. A summer week spent with Bobby, steaks on the grill, his first beer in his hand. Drool pools in his mouth. He closes his eyes. Don’t think. Lose himself in memories. The only way to keep Hell out of his head.

One of Alastair’s claws traces his lips. They’ve been down this path before, and Dean keeps his mouth firmly closed, though he knows Alastair will get his way eventually, use Dean however he pleases.

As if his mind is being read (can Alastair do that? Dean’s never really sure what rules apply to Hell and what don’t) Alastair laughs. “Much as I love your mouth, that’s not what I’m thinking about right now.”

Dean clenches his teeth, but of course Alastair pries them apart in the end. Then, he presses something to Dean’s lips. Fuck. Meat, juicy and tender, charred on the outside, bloody on the inside. He instinctively bites down, and it’s better than any burger that’s ever been waiting for him at the end of a long hunt—

And then it occurs to him what he’s eating, and where it came from, and he wants to spit it out but he can’t seem to open his lips and oh god he’s so fucking hungry

*

“Dean? Dean!” and he’s outside and on the pavement retching, choking, spitting, trying to empty himself when there’s nothing left to purge but the memories.

Sam is kneeling next to him, hand resting on his shoulder. “What is it? Do you need to go to the hospital?”

He shakes his head. Wipes his lips and spits again. Tries not to remember (he remembers all of it).

“No. I don’t know what it was. Guess I’m still adjusting to being topside.”

He stands, leans against the Impala. Says, “Just get me some coffee? I’ll wait out here.”

Sam hesitates. “You sure? Have you eaten anything?”

“Yeah. Of course. It’s just. I dunno. I’ll get lunch, promise.”

The way that Sam looks at him tells him that there’s more on his mind, but Dean’s the one who just came back from the dead, and there are some privileges that come with that. Like not having to give his brother a goddamn itinerary of everything he’s eaten in the past day.

Finally, Sam nods. “One coffee. Got it.” And he disappears inside, and Dean focuses on the surface of his car beneath his hands, and not on the taste in his mouth (he can still taste it, fat melting, filling him, giving him a rare moment of pleasure).

Dean keeps his word and gets lunch. A salad, grilled chicken. Sam looks at him like he’s crazy, like maybe he isn’t really Dean after all. And honestly, Dean can’t fault him for his suspicion, but still.

“I just wanted something light,” he mutters. “Jesus. Cut me some slack.”

Sam raises his eyebrows and his hands, in a classic didn’t-say-anything gesture. Dean chokes down the salad, greens bitter even under the dressing. But god, he’s hungry. Is scared he always will be.

For dinner he asks Sam to just order pizza. Cheese. Sam agrees, of course, not going to be the one to deny the once-dead man what he wants. There are, at least, some plusses to this whole situation.

But when he sleeps, hiding is impossible.

*

Alastair watches as he approaches the man on the rack. “I want you to try something different today,” he murmurs. “You’re a good apprentice, Dean. A quick learner. But I want to see a bit of… finesse, this time around.”

His hands, large, clawed, scaled, covering Dean’s. Guiding the knife. How to get the meat from the ribs. How to cut the tenderest slices. Alastair skillfully pulls the fat from the old man’s potbelly and tosses it to the side. Hot coals cover the area of Hell where they spend most of the time, and the air soon fills with the scent of meat crisping.

Alastair touching him, tracing lines up and down his legs, his back, his arms, murmuring praise. He shows Dean how to suck soft flesh from finger bones, and it tastes so much better when it’s not his own fingers. The man screams and screams, but it’s the first time torturing has actually made him feel good. Complete.

*

Dean eats. Just enough to keep Sam happy. Just enough for Sam to not notice anything is wrong.

It’s not a lot. Less than it should be. Less, he’s fairly sure, than it would be if Ruby wasn’t around.

Breakfasts aren’t as bad. He can get away with coffee, maybe fruit or some sort of breakfast sandwich without meat. The first time he tells a waitress he doesn’t want bacon, his brother looks at him like he’s lost his mind, but Dean ignores him. Thankfully, he doesn’t say anything.

Lunches and dinner are worse. Dean never really thought about how much his diet relied on red meat before. How he’s used to just being able to grab a burger as a default. Sink his lips into thick meat, let the juices run down his chin. His stomach turns at the thought, but he’s _got_ to be normal, he’s _got_ to forget.

He becomes an expert at eating even faster than normal, to Sam’s disgust. Don’t think about the texture. Don’t think about the taste. Force down the protein. Make himself feel full. Drive away the hunger for a few minutes.

He becomes even better at hiding it when he pukes – at going outside before Sam is done so he can “call Bobby,” when he’s really on his knees at the edge of the parking lot or bending over a dumpster in the back alley, throwing up a meal he’s barely digested. Or at holding it in, speeding back to the motel, and running into the bathroom before Sam can ever suspect that something is wrong. Turning the shower up full-blast and vomiting as silently as he can.

It doesn’t happen after every meal. Especially if he drinks enough during and afterward to knock himself out. But it happens often enough. He knows he’s hurting himself. Knows he’s losing weight and muscle mass. And he can feel the difference too, how diminished his energy tends to be (though he convinces himself that that, at least, may just be due to the shitty situation, to not wanting to work with angels and demons and think about the oncoming apocalypse).

But it’s like the drinking. Dean’s not dumb. He knows his habits aren’t the healthiest. He’s smart enough to be able to sit back and look at his situation pragmatically, and identify numerous changes that would improve his lifestyle.

The problem is, he’s damned if he’s going to actually do any of them. Because the alcohol keeps him going, because his dad raised him to save the world and he can’t stop now. Because maybe he doesn’t like the feel of bile in his throat, but it’s better than keeping the meat inside of him, than constantly remembering what he’s done. And it’s better than just starving himself. He’s been starving for so long.

His teeth biting down on his own raw flesh. Alastair burning parts of him, then forcing them down his mouth (and oh, god, he was so hungry the pain seemed worth it). Slices of his heart tender on his tongue. Alastair licking charred strips down his cock, then scraping them with his teeth and grinding their mouths together, forcing Dean to take the meat, to take himself in, and he refused for as long as he fucking could, he tried, he really did—

*

Once, Alastair leaves him alone. Just chained to the walls of a dark and tiny cave, somewhere away from the usual ruckus of screaming, howling, clanking chains and desperate cries. So still that his ears ring, and he scrapes his fingernails against the stone, desperate for any sound at all, until they turn ragged and leave silent bloody streaks. At some point, he starts talking to himself. Anything to fight the emptiness.

Sometimes it rains, somehow. Not like on Earth, the even outpourings of clouds. More like a stream, as if there were a hose above him. Just enough so he can quench his thirst so his body doesn’t dry out. Because that’s not the point.

Because this time is about the hunger.

He tried to lose himself in memories. Tried to think of Sam, Dad, Bobby, Lisa, Ellen, Jo, anyone and everyone he had ever known. Remember them. Remember Earth. Remember being alive.

He’s so fucking hungry. He doesn’t know how long it’s been since Alastair locked him in here.

Eventually, he stops talking. Throat too weak to continue. And the thing is, what he’s been saying, it doesn’t mean anything anymore. Language babbles past his lips, but the definitions of the words are lost to his mind.

Words lost to his mind. His mind lost to words.

Images he clung to once have no significance now. He tries to remember why he’s here. Where he is. Who he is.

He bites down and down on his lips, desperate for the taste of blood, trying to feed, trying for anything, but it’s too late; he doesn’t have the energy left to eat, to earn back what he needs. He wonders, in a way that he can’t quite shape into proper thoughts, if this is the final death. Alone. Ashes to ashes, dust to dust.

He’s so fucking hungry. His bones turned to sand; his skin an empty sack longing to be filled. Bit by bit, his muscles degrade. Chest caves into itself. Empty.

He tries to conjure the meaningless images. If he doesn’t know what they are, they are at least something. But there’s nothing there. He thinks that he was someone, once.

When Alastair comes back, Dean remembers a bit. Remembers enough. Remembers how to get himself back.

Alastair has to kneel down to hear him. “What was that? Say it again, my boy.”

“Yes,” he rasps out, because he only vaguely knows what it means, but he also knows it means everything, means he’ll be somebody again.

“Yes what?” asks Alastair, and it’s so dark, but Dean knows that he’s smiling.

“Let me down. I’ll do what you say.”

Alastair removes his chains with a flick of his hand, and Dean remembers remembers remembers Sam and Dad and where he is and what he’s just done, and oh god what has he just done, but

but Alastair is pulling him to his feet, and suddenly he can stand again, he’s whole again, and Alastair is pressing his wrist to Dean’s mouth, and Dean can taste his blood, taste the edges of his flesh and it’s so fucking good and then Alastair is feeding him pieces of himself that he thought he lost ages ago, to time and waste but here he is again, and—

he isn’t hungry anymore.

*

Castiel finds him bent over a toilet one night when Sam is out doing god-knows-what with Ruby. No warning – there never is with him. A swoosh of wings and suddenly Dean isn’t alone in his worship of the porcelain god.

“At least you didn’t catch me with my pants down,” he mutters. Doesn’t bother looking up. Can picture the confusion in the angel’s face just fine.

“Stand,” Castiel orders, and when Dean ignores him, he pulls him up to his feet anyway. Dean tries to twist away, but he’s tired. Weak, really, and Cas is a warrior of God, iron-willed and inhumanly strong.

Castiel stares at him, head tilted slightly. Looks disappointed, Dean thinks. Not that surprising. Dean’s used to letting those around him down.

“I didn’t bring you back to let you waste away again,” he says, and without preamble he lays his fingers upon Dean’s forehead. Dean gasps as his body contracts and spasms, as fat and muscle are restored to the condition he’s tried to keep them in for most of his life.

Cas lets him go. He falls against the sink, braces himself upon it. He will not cower on his knees before an angel. Won’t give him the satisfaction.

And Castiel is still watching him as he tried to figure out what to say. His eyes unreadable in the dark.

“You need to maintain your body,” Castiel finally says. “I haven’t the time to fix you whenever you decide to let yourself disappear.”

“If you’re so powerful, why can’t you fix me?” Dean asks. “Why do I still remember?”

“If you forgot, you wouldn’t know what we’re fighting against. What we need prevent from coming to Earth.”

Silence. Dean wants to contradict him. Of course he’d know. He’s not dumb; he’s always known that Hell was bad and all that shit.

But. It’s not like Castiel is wrong. The chronic emptiness in him, the vacuum that makes him feel as if he’s about to collapse inwards on himself – it’s emptiness, but in a fucked up way, it’s motivating too. If the whole world feels like he does, they’re fucked. No hope. No point in anything.

Dean won’t give the angel the satisfaction of knowing that he understands. And so he doesn’t say anything, and Castiel leaves.

*

At breakfast the next morning, he reaches over and steals a strip of bacon from Sam’s plate. Sam rolls his eyes, but doesn’t say anything. Doesn’t notice any significance. Dean chews and chews the burnt meat. Doesn’t think. Forces it down, and it tastes like a punishment, but he eats until he isn’t hungry anymore. And he tells himself he’s fine.


End file.
